


What Do We Do Now

by cute_lil_nerd



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Slow Burn, War Rebuilding, no ron bashing
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-11
Updated: 2019-01-14
Packaged: 2019-10-08 11:40:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17385806
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cute_lil_nerd/pseuds/cute_lil_nerd
Summary: Hermione Granger doesn't hate Malfoy. He's nowhere near the top of her list of things to worry about. She's learned. She's hardened, but she's softened too.





	1. Rebuilding

**Author's Note:**

> My first fic ever, after years of being in this fandom. It will have cliches, because of course. I'm going to meander for a bit and kind of see where this takes me, because I have a couple ideas so far.

She watched. She fumed, with her nose in the air as she snippily informed him that there’s no need to be rude. When he is anyway, she tells him to shove it where the sun doesn’t shine. She was a fierce ruthless lioness in public, standing stiff and quiet as she watched others rise to the occasion, defending her honor on a Quidditch field. She cried later. She cursed his voice to sound like he spent his free time going crazy on helium when he got Harry kicked off of the Quidditch team. She didn’t think about him in sixth year, besides reassuring Harry that he wasn’t a murdering psychopath. She would regret that decision later. She locked eyes with him once, only once, when she was bleeding under his chandelier, screaming to the gloating portraits, crying to a crazy witch. She looked once and the anger that swept through her at his obvious inaction, his hesitant cowardice, his pale form sustained her a vital few more minutes until Ron and Harry came through. 

She didn’t think about him again for months. There was so much to deal with, and she was so, so tired. But she wasn’t just magical, and she couldn’t just fade into the background, because she was Muggle, and she knew the consequences of war on governments. She knew the power she wielded, and the influence she could hold. This was her chance to remake the world. And she wasn’t alone either. She had Harry and Ron and Ginny and Luna and Neville. The five people she trusted most were there, and they weren’t going anywhere soon. She was looking into the horizon, and she saw a better place. She was going to make it happen.


	2. Cleansing

“Ready?” Ron breathed at her and Harry. They all glanced at each other, instinctively moving just a fraction closer.

Hermione breathed in and spoke on the exhale, “Yes”. 

She was ready. For what was behind the door at least. 

“If I go to punch him halfway through” Harry sighed “Don’t even try and stop me”. He peeked at them from underneath his fringe and grinned. “They’d probably hand me over another Order of Merlin just for that”

To her side, Ron snorted.

“Mate, if anything, I’d join you”

Both of them glanced sideways at her.

“Fine” she sighed with exasperation, her lips twitching slightly upward, “I give you my permission. And if it looks like you’re struggling, I might even join in”.

After their quiet laughter faded, all three of them looked towards the door once again. Hermione sighed, stepped forward, and pushed open the door. It opened into a wide, yet somehow oppressive room. Rows of seats tumbled forward into a wide open circle where, in the very center, sat a chair with chains wrapped around the seat.

As Hermione, Ron, and Harry quietly stepped across the rows to find their seats, a camera flashed from the corner. The one press member allowed in here- definitely not Rita Skeeter, Hermione thought hotly- was the only one they all trusted at the moment: Luna Lovegood.

Harry had taken her aside a couple weeks ago, and asked if she would be okay with covering the war trials. All of them knew that any other “journalist” would seize on the chance to rapidly spin up crazy conspiracy theories that could potentially change the outcome of some of the more important trials.

As they took their seats in the middle bench, next to Ginny and Neville, the judge, Susan Bones, struck her gavel, and the process began. 

“Order! The proceedings will cover the trial of the Malfoy family today” Susan glanced at her notes, rapidly running her eyes over them. “The court will try each member individually, in the following order: Lucius Abraxas Malfoy, Narcissa Malfoy, and Draco Lucius Malfoy”.

Susan peered sternly at the assembly and announced, “I expect the court to hold no prejudice. I know that we have come out of” here, her voice shook, “dark times, but we can only hope to execute justice here, not our personal vendettas”.

With that, she turned around and gestured to the attendant at the door to call the eldest Malfoy to the hall. At least Hermione had made sure that the use of Dementors should be drastically reduced, thus allowing the more innocent of the trials to not be subjected to unfair brutality.

Hermione gripped Ginny’s hand next to her as the door opened. 

In another world, Hermione would have stifled a gasp, perhaps shocked at the condition Lucius Malfoy was in. He was haggard and sallow. His hair was tangled and bedraggled, and his eyes darted wildly from face to face, hoping for an anchor to latch on to in the sea that had so rudely tossed him from his throne. He wasn’t yet quite broken, but definitely beaten down. In another world, Hermione would have felt some sort of pity for the man, a flicker of sympathy for what he must have endured to arrive at this condition. But she was different now, and there was no remorse left in her for someone who had dared to hurt her or her friends.

The chamber was dead silent as Lucius was seated by the attendant. All faces were on the center of the room, slightly leaning towards the attraction, as though drawn by an undercurrent of the knowledge of what was to come. 

Susan looked down at him, her mouth slightly curled up in disgust. She lifted her wand and struck it the table with a light tap, causing the chains around the chair to rattle down, snaking around Lucius’ arms, keeping him in place.

The sound of the chains was echoing in the silence of the chamber. After the chains stopped moving, Lucius lifted his head, his eyes wilder than before, staring in desperation at the head of the chamber.

Stare and wish all you want, Hermione thought viciously. You won’t be getting any quarter; at least not this time around.

The court was silent, so Susan didn’t even bother lifting her gavel.. Without clearing her throat, a sign of weakness, Susan had told her earlier, she begun.  
“The accused stands charged with murder, accessory to murder, accessory to violent crimes resulting in the damage and loss of lives of many, bribery, manipulation, 74 uses of the Unforgivable Curses, and co-conspirator in the spread of ideas that propagated false beliefs”.

Susan peered over the top of her desk to Lucius. “How does the accused plead?”

Lucius darted his eyes around the court and wet his lips. With a slightly cracking voice, he announced in a voice that carried throughout the chamber, “Not guilty”.

Whispers broke out immediately among the court, interspersed with snatches of quiet, derisive laughter.

Hermione felt rage rising from deep within her. How dare he try and plead innocent? How dare he try to wiggle his way out, again? To her right, she heard Ginny snort at the notion too. Her friends on her left were similarly enraged, the tips of Ron’s ears beginning to glow red, while Harry watched with a pinched face.

Susan used her gavel this time. “Does the defendant have a defense?”

Lucius seemed to falter. That’s right. Never had had to come this far, have you? Always paid your way out of jail. Not this time.

“N-no. I suppose I don’t have a defense, really”. Lucius suddenly sat up straighter, a glint appearing in his eyes. “I will act as my own”.

The trial went very badly for Lucius, and very well for the interests of everyone else in the court. His defenses crumbled around his ears as angry citizens, one by one took the witness position, condemning him with their own cattle brand of justice, leaving it searing, sizzling into his skin.

He was sentenced to three lifetimes of Azkaban.

Narcissa’s trial was shorter. She claimed guilty, and was largely pardoned based on her rescue of Harry. House parole for the next five years, and permanent parole for the rest of her life. It could have gone worse for her.

Ginny leaned over and whispered, “Leave it to Harry to somehow be responsible for the saving of the evil”. Hermione laughed with a quick upturn of her lips.

Susan called for attention once again. “The next and last on trial for today is Draco Lucius Malfoy. Let him in”.

The door swung open.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you're here, thanks for reading this guys! I've always hated it when Lucius got off scot-free in other fics, which is probably why I was harsh on him. Leave a comment! I swear, the Dramione is coming soon.


End file.
